


Fear and Hunting in Las Vegas

by AvaMclean



Series: Miles to Go [1]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Pre-Series, Teenage Rebellion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-05
Updated: 2013-08-11
Packaged: 2017-12-17 19:57:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/871396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvaMclean/pseuds/AvaMclean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The love of a good woman won’t change a man, but the love of a smart-mouthed valley girl with control issues might.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Title :: Cherry Bomb  
Rating :: FR13  
Disclaimer :: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all related characters are copyright Joss Whedon and ME. No infringement intended.

Note :: Part of the ‘Miles to Go’’ series, but this series of ficlets will happen _before_ our Slayer makes it to Sunnydale. 

Synopsis :: The love of a good woman won’t change a man, but the love of a smart-mouthed valley girl with control issues might.

**Cherry Bomb**

His nose twitched as he turned another page and brought the scent of cedar and something oddly floral wafting up from the tome. Dark brows pulled low as Pike continued reading about Pope Sylvester II and his demise by dismemberment. Blue eyes left the musty book to land on the spiral bound notebook in his lap and the hearts Summers had doodled in the margin. His mouth curved upward even as he shook his head and read through his notes from his time spent at one of the numerous local libraries.

Oliver Pike, self-proclaimed badass, was in Las Vegas and had spent an entire day trapped in the air-conditioned comfort of Sahara West Library’s computer lab researching newspaper clippings. His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward, rereading the part where Sylvester had been missing his tongue, heart and eyes before he broke into a grin and glanced towards the closed bathroom door of their motel room. 

“Summers?” He couldn’t help but add, “Jackpot!” 

The muttered, “Really? Jackpot?” only had his smile stretching as he heard the disgruntled Slayer finish, “You’re lameness knows no bounds.” 

He rose from the uncomfortable chair he’d been crouched in for the last three hours and winced as his lower back ached in protest. One hand held his notes and the other his spine as he bent slightly forward and sighed when the pressure eased up a bit. He straightened and grabbed the tome he’d been reading before making his way past their beds and to the bathroom door. “Meridiana.” 

The knob rattled and the door opened only enough so that Summers’ face could be seen through the crack and her green eyes, outlined in black, narrowed on him as she questioned, “Mary-who’s-it?”

His brow rose and corrected, “Meridiana. She’s a succubus.”

“We knew that already.” Her bare mouth, which looked naked next to her done up eyes, turned down, “Or at least we’d better have known that or I got this job for nothing.” 

“Not for nothing.” Pike countered, adding, “We knew the last three victims of this thing were customers of the Ch-Cherry Bomb.” He coughed to cover his stumble over the name of the establishment and Summers’ eyes narrowed further, so he could no longer discern their color, and she growled before slamming the door shut. “Hey now, Barbie, I offered to case this place—” 

“It kills men,” she retorted in her best ‘duh’ voice, though the effect was muffled by the closed door, “And you’re a man,” there was a slight pause before she added, “mostly.” 

He snapped the tome shut and promptly sneezed as the scent of cedar became overpowering. Rubbing his nose with his palm he asked, “Do you want to know what I learned or not?” 

“Is not really an option?” His eyes closed and his head fell back as he silently counted in his head and by the time he got to twelve Summers questioned, voice hesitant, “Pike?” He didn’t reply, but his eyes opened to stare up at the watermarked ceiling and she explained, “That was a joke. I was making with the funny.” His head came up and his chin dropped as he shot a glare at the closed door and Buffy’s voice grew quieter as she finished, “Apparently not that funny.”

He ignored her pouting, it was easier when she wasn’t doing it to his face, and focused on the hunt and smiled because Summers hated calling these little trips that. “Meridiana offered Pope Sylvester II sex, magical knowledge and power if he remained faithful to her and according to all accounts he did up until his death when he repented his sins. Apparently that wasn’t part of the deal and she dismembered him, keeping parts as keepsakes.” 

“Parts?” there was a pause, “Let me guess. The missing pieces from our murdered guys.” 

“You got it in one.” 

“Pike?”

He muffled question he heard in his name had him frowning. “Yeah?”

“You figured all this out in like a day.” He nodded with her statement, even though she couldn’t see it and made his way towards the desk to drop off the book. The door to the bathroom opened behind him and Buffy’s voice was clear as she finished, “That’s kinda impressive.” 

“Kinda?” Pike scoffed and turned around. 

His mouth opened, ready to finish his thought, but all he could do was stare at all the tanned flesh exposed by Summers’ outfit for work. He blinked and swallowed, blue eyes widening as he took in the fishnet stockings covering her legs up to a pair of incredibly short shorts that were offset by a tank top that had the establishment’s name embossed across her breasts and the ‘o’ in bomb was shaped like a cherry with a lit fuse for a stem. 

He swallowed again and simply stared, still unable to form a coherent thought, and Summers shifted on her heels, taking a small step back and into the bathroom as she offered, “If you think this is bad you should see what the other girls are wearing.” 

He cleared his throat and ignored the fact that her lips were fire engine red and glossy and entirely too distracting to retort, “Summers, the other girls are strippers.” 

Her tone grew defensive, “I know.” 

“Right,” Pike focused on her face, and only her face, as he added, “So tonight is recon only. I’m still not sure how to kill this thing yet.” 

She smiled and it turned her from ‘walking sex’ to ‘girl next door’ and Pike forced himself to sit in the uncomfortable chair or risk making his way across the motel room and ruining the hair and makeup that had taken her an hour to prepare. 

“I won’t kill anything unless it tries to kill me first.” The solemn promise made him smile and that smile widened when she hastily added, “Or someone else.” 

“You’ll do fine.” 

“Of course I will.” 

“Don’t jinx it.” 

“I did not—”

“Don’t.”

She huffed. 

He smirked.

**The end.**

Note :: This series should probably be called ‘The Adventures of Buffy and Pike’ but I couldn’t ignore the nod to Hunter S. Thompson who strikes me as someone Pike would find interesting. 


	2. The Domestic Trap

Title: The Domestic Trap  
Series: Miles to Go  
Rating: FR13  
Word Count: 1020   
Prompt: #367 possession @ tamingthemuse   
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all related characters are copyright Joss Whedon and ME. No infringement intended.   
Note: This story is part of the ‘Fear and Hunting in Las Vegas’ shorts. 

Synopsis: Casual and Summers seemed as unmixable as that oil and water shit.

* * *

The bathroom was still steamy from Summers’ most recent shower and the mirror behind Pike was more foggy than reflective, but he’d found a comfortable position against the wall in which to lean as Summers regaled him of her cigar girl exploits. Exploits that had secured her enough tips to move them from the motel they’d been crashing in to something larger and more upscale. There weren’t watermarks on these ceilings and clean towels had already been present in the bathroom—the room Summers had squealed over, then promptly claimed as her own. 

Her toiletries, who needed that much makeup when they ran away from home, were already spread across the counter and Pike couldn’t even hazard a guess as to what the slim rod was that plugged into the wall. Well, actually he could guess, but it’d probably end up with Summers fuming and him hurting. He liked his manly parts where they were. _Thanks_. Pike had made the mistake of treating Summers like Benny when they’d first met and that rib still hurt when it rained. 

Summers had settled herself on the edge of the bathtub, one foot planted securely on the tile floor and the other was balanced on the edge with her as she drew a razor from ankle to calf. She was explaining something about a customer getting a little too grabby as she continued to run the razor up the back of her leg and as she smiled up at him he was suddenly struck by how domestic their current situation seemed. 

She was wrapped up in the hotel supplied robe and her cheeks were still flushed from the recent shower. Her face was makeup free and all that blonde hair was piled on top of her head with one of those claw-like things holding it in place. She looked content and Pike should have been feeling uncomfortable with entire scenario, but instead he was feeling possessive of Summers in a way that would lead to more of his ribs being cracked. They didn’t have that type of relationship—though not from his lack of trying—but the basic hope of casual sex and the something stirring in his gut were two different beasts entirely. 

_Sonofabitch_.

When the hell had he fallen for a smart-mouthed Valley Girl with control issues and sticky fingers?

“One of them offered me a hundred dollars if I let him suck on my toes.”

The casual statement drew Pike from his internal epiphany and he blinked stupidly at Summers a moment before requesting, “Come again?” 

She wiggled her toes, showing off the neon pink polish and focused on getting the back of her ankles hair free as she reiterated, “He offered me a hundred to let him suck on my toes. Which I just don’t get.” 

A frown tugged his brows down as Pike replied, voice tight with jealousy, “It’s a kink, Summers.” 

“Kink?” She questioned and looked up at him, her own brows tugging together as she parroted, “Kink.”

The confusion reminded Pike that Summers was a sophomore and only fifteen and he was likely going to hell. He was a nineteen year old degenerated that had failed his senior year the first time ‘round and, since he as on this little excursion with Summers, most likely the second time as well. 

He cleared his throat before clarifying, “Kink as in kinky. A fetish. He _like_ likes feet.” 

Her nose wrinkled, eyes going wide and Pike just managed to refrain from telling her how damn adorable she looked disgusted— _Christ_ , he had it bad—before she shuddered. “Gross.” 

A smirked tugged in the corner of his mouth as Pike couldn’t help but add, “Charge more than a hundred next time.”

“I didn’t let him do it!” She snapped as she brought she bent her knee and started making smaller scrapes with the razor across it. 

“If you say so.”

“You’re a pig.” 

“I’m your pig,” he countered with a wink.

She snorted, “Idiot,” and then shook her head before focusing on a completely different topic. “So how am I to figure out who’s the succubus when _all_ the strippers use _all_ the men? There’s no rhyme or reason and in some of the girls no rhythm,” her nose wrinkled again, “at all.” 

The leg she was shaving was straightened, foot falling to rest inside the tub as she leaned forward and rinsed off her calf. Pike watched her repeat the rinse and then lather of her thigh as he considered the question and the best way to answer her and he wasn’t at all distracted by her damp skin. The fact that it wasn’t until she caught him staring and raised her brows that he finally spoke was a coincidence. 

“We know the murders started a little over six months ago, right?” Summers nodded and started shaving her thigh before she lifted her free hand to make a carry on motion as she focused on the task and Pike continued, “Why don’t we focus on the newer dancers—”

“Not just the dancers,” Buffy interrupted as she stood, straightening her leg as she tackled the back of her thigh, “The other cigar girls could easily be the succubus and there’s the hostess slash coat girl.” 

“Thanks for narrowing that down.” 

“You want to be quick about it?” Buffy countered, “Or right about it?” 

He sighed and frowned when she lifted her leg from the back to prop her foot and its pink toes on the closed toilet lid. She snagged one of the several bottles of lotion lining the tank and proceeded to rub a liberal amount into the skin of her newly shaved leg. Her thievery of them from a cleaning cart they’d passed earlier made sudden sense as she used an entire little bottle of lotion on just one damn leg. 

“Well?”

He frowned trying to remember the question before rolling his eyes, “Right. I wanna be right.” 

“Then we do this the hard way.” 

“There is no easy way when you’re concerned.” 

“Pretty much.”

Pike sighed and Buffy set about shaving her other leg. 

_Christ_ they really were a couple.

* * *

The end.


End file.
